The state can use its centralized negotiating power to get lower prices on standardized packages, and accordingly a floor for welfare could be provided at a lower cost than just redistributing income, which, though it gives people more agency, can more easily just inflate prices generally and leave people more liable to impulse spending.
I think this part of the argument fails, at least for things that work well as market commodities. The main advantage of individuals selecting suppliers over governments selecting suppliers isn’t that it gives people more agency, it’s that it has better aligned incentives and is more resistant to corruption. Impulse buying is a minor problem; packages containing the wrong items, and items that are useless for hard-to-recognize reasons, is a major problem.
In general, when there are conspicuous mismatches between what the government tells people to buy and what they actually buy, there are usually good reasons for it. Nutrition, in particular, is an area where increasing government control would be disastrous; the US goernment already exert some control over some poorer peoples’ food purchases via eligibility restrictions, and while the intent is to encourage people to eat healthier, the actual effect is mostly the opposite, because they operate on a model of nutrition that’s less accurate than most peoples’ instincts.
A simpler solution to the impulse-purchase problem would be time restricted funds: regular money, except it can only be spent on items with a long shipping delay and a cancellation window.
I think I agree with the time-restricted fund idea on competitive commodities as being better than just providing the commodities since there aren’t going to be a lot of further economy of scale benefits.
Having competing services and basic income coming out of the same gov budget does create pressure to not make things as poorly as past gov programs. The incentives should still be aligned, because people can still choose to opt out just like the normal market.
On food, the outcomes shouldn’t be as bad as food stamp restrictions over time not just because of the opt-out option, but also because the data will be more legible to the government and enable better standards over time where we otherwise have pretty bad food science.
I think people would only opt-in to the food plan if it basically allows them to capture benefits somewhere else within the service package they select (e.g. extra basic income via reducing expected medical bills). Otherwise basic income should dominate a food plan as an option unless the person is looking for a way to tie their own hands.
I think this part of the argument fails, at least for things that work well as market commodities. The main advantage of individuals selecting suppliers over governments selecting suppliers isn’t that it gives people more agency, it’s that it has better aligned incentives and is more resistant to corruption. Impulse buying is a minor problem; packages containing the wrong items, and items that are useless for hard-to-recognize reasons, is a major problem.
In general, when there are conspicuous mismatches between what the government tells people to buy and what they actually buy, there are usually good reasons for it. Nutrition, in particular, is an area where increasing government control would be disastrous; the US goernment already exert some control over some poorer peoples’ food purchases via eligibility restrictions, and while the intent is to encourage people to eat healthier, the actual effect is mostly the opposite, because they operate on a model of nutrition that’s less accurate than most peoples’ instincts.
A simpler solution to the impulse-purchase problem would be time restricted funds: regular money, except it can only be spent on items with a long shipping delay and a cancellation window.
I think I agree with the time-restricted fund idea on competitive commodities as being better than just providing the commodities since there aren’t going to be a lot of further economy of scale benefits.
Having competing services and basic income coming out of the same gov budget does create pressure to not make things as poorly as past gov programs. The incentives should still be aligned, because people can still choose to opt out just like the normal market.
On food, the outcomes shouldn’t be as bad as food stamp restrictions over time not just because of the opt-out option, but also because the data will be more legible to the government and enable better standards over time where we otherwise have pretty bad food science.
I think people would only opt-in to the food plan if it basically allows them to capture benefits somewhere else within the service package they select (e.g. extra basic income via reducing expected medical bills). Otherwise basic income should dominate a food plan as an option unless the person is looking for a way to tie their own hands.